Star Trek Online early impressions.


I started playing the open beta of Star Trek Online last night and
have been mildly surprised by the amount of time I have spent playing
it. In fact I only stopped playing it today because I got disconnected
from the server and can't currently get back on.

When I was installing the game my first thought was "this is going to
shit". Not in a craptastic way, but in a seriously bad game way.

My first reaction when I saw the colourful graphics and realised that
I had to hold down both mouse buttons to look and move was to start
out on a mental rant about how clueless and out of touch today's game
designers have become.

Then I piddled around with the graphics settings and key bindings for
a while and got it looking better and worked out how to have free
mouselook and movement. The need to switch in and out of free mode to
interact with people and items takes some getting used to. I also
dislike the fact that firing a weapon is initiated by pressing a key
rather than using LMB, but I suspect that it's possible to remap that.

So far the game reminds me of both of the Star Trek Elite Force games
from a few years back. The graphics are very similar to those of EF2
in terms of shading but are obviously more advanced. The biggest
downside for me so far is that it's third person mode only. However, I
think I could get used to that.

Gameplay wise it's bog standard MMORPG type fayre. Go here, fix that,
fetch ten of these, kill 6 Borg Drones etc etc. You have the usual
skill points and character points to spend as Science Officer,
Engineer or Medic. The difference being that it's set in the Star Trek
world which is refreshingly new (ish).

Flying your first Starship is a bit weird. The ship avatar is tiny and
the controls very basic. But the size of the ship adds to the feeling
of being a very small speck in a very large Star System.

As with any MMO there are a ton of things to learn about all the
different key binding, hotbars, skills and customisations. I always
find this part of learning about a game to be daunting, but also
rather enjoyable. The learning curve that takes a player through the
stages of being unconsciously incompetent to be being consciously
incompetent, unconsciously competent and then consciously competent
can be a reward in its own right.

Star Trek Online isn't going to be a World of Warcraft killer, but I
think it will have a reasonable following. Quite a few people are
already complaining that it isn't the sandbox type of game that they'd
hoped for. It's a bit early to criticise that aspect of the gameplay
as a very large part of the game is still off limits until the game is
released.

From a personal perspective I will likely subscribe, at least for a
while anyway. I can tell that the game won't have me hopelessly
addicted in the way that Hellgate: London did, or that Borderlands
currently does. But I will enjoy playing it in the same way that I
enjoyed the occasional hour or two playing Tabula Rasa every other day
or so.

Gaming is a strange beast. I really thought that Fallen Earth would be
my next MMO timesink. I really intensely dislike that game now that
it's out and I've had the chance to try it. I fully expected to
dislike Star Trek Online and yet it turns out that it has my gaming
attention from the off.
--
Rob
.

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